Reviews

It’s absolutely no secret that I’m a giant Legend of Zelda nerd. I’ve even worked on fan art in the past, based on Majora’s Mask and Zelda II: The Adventure of Link. But recently, I wanted to create a more universal design that would broadly encapsulate so much of the franchise. I’d initially began a rough sketch of this idea…

Hello, dear friends. It’s officially been a year since I started my Redeeming Love review series. A lot has happened in that year, some of which I’m hesitant to talk about at any length on this particular platform. Suffice it to say that every time I’ve tried to pick up the book to continue the review, I’ve been reduced to a…

I love The Legend of Zelda franchise. The storylines and gameplay and puzzles and design are all just utterly delightful to me. In general, my favourite Zelda game is whatever one I’m currently playing. Which right now happens to be Skyward Sword. As I was wrapping up my first playthrough, I wrote about it on Zeldathon: Because it’s Dangerous to Go Alone. But going through it a second time, I’m noticing a lot of different things that I’d like to parse out. Spoilers abound, so be aware.

I mention it because one of the defenses of his insensitivity (to put it mildly) was that his argument was logically sound. And that’s a point that gets brought up an awful lot in discussions of social justice and in general when someone is called out for doing something harmful. It’s especially a point brought up from men against women, usually as a way of gas-lighting us and saying, “You’re too emotional to get this, let me logic at you in a manly fashion.” It’s sexist, it’s dismissive, and it focuses on one aspect of a situation to the exclusion of all else.

As I said on Twitter in my original thoughts about Dawkins’ asshattery:

This is the kind of argument I see quite a lot from those who tend to hold a lot of privilege & experiential ignorance of the topic at hand. Honestly…it makes me think of that scene in the RDJ/Jude Law Sherlock Holmes. Holmes is holding something in his hand, the end of which is mere inches from Watson’s face. Watson: “Get that thing out of my face.” Holmes replies, “It’s not in your face, it’s in my hand.” That’s what these logical men are like. That’s their argument. TECHNICALLY, they’re right. But the practical application & observation of the situation shows that one can be correct but still wrong. In this situation, the argument can (& has been, repeatedly) made that Dawkins wasn’t minimizing when he was making the comparison. TECHNICALLY, he wasn’t. But functionally, he was. Just like the thing TECHNICALLY was in Holmes’ hand but FUNCTIONALLY was in Watson’s face.

(If you’re unfamiliar with Cliff Pervocracy’s missing stair analogy and don’t want to click the link above, he basically outlines that often communities gloss over abusers in their midst the way that someone who lives in a house with a missing stair just becomes accustomed to skipping that step rather than fixing it.)

Just because I’m a good person, just because I’m progressive, just because I’m involved in working towards a better world, doesn’t mean that I am unaffected by privilege, exempt from critique, incapable of bearing responsibility for abusive behavior…or even incapable of being an asshat.